We observed the formation process of Ti-Al intermetallic compound powder during mechanical alloying of a powder mixture of Ti and Al by using a tumbling ball mill and found that the formation of the intermetallic compound powder was promoted by nitrogen gas in a milling atmosphere . Based on this finding, we introduced a small quantity of nitrogen gas into the milling atmosphere in order to shorten the time required for producing the intermetallic compound powder and to improve its yield. As a

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... esult, we found that an intervenient introduction of 1vol .% nitrogen gas into the milling atmosphere can achieve a yield of 98.8% after milling for 1440ks .